What is OFCCP Compliance?
February 8th, 2010
The Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) is a division of the US Department of Labor that has been charged with implementing the laws that require equal employment opportunity for anyone working within the government contract system. As stated in the OFCCP mission statement, this would mean enforcing laws “that ban discrimination and require Federal contractors and subcontractors to take affirmative action to ensure that all individuals have an equal opportunity for employment, without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, disability or status as a Vietnam era or special disabled veteran.”
That’s a pretty comprehensive law to enforce. Whether you are an employee seeking work or an employer looking to hire new staff, it’s important that you are aware of all the ramifications of the OFCCP compliance.
The first thing to keep in mind with OFCCP compliance is that it applies directly to any contractors or their subcontractors who have work with the federal government exceeding ten thousand dollars. Even if the company you work for has a contract going on in another division or even another state, you must still be in compliance. This also applies to financial institutions which do business with the government. However, this doesn’t mean that all the vendors and suppliers you might use during the course of your business needs an affirmative action program (AAP) but if you enter into contracts with these parties you will need to include an errors and omission (EO) clause in order to be in compliance and protect the interests of your business. The bottom line is that if your company or any part of your company that works with the government, you will be expected to be OFCCP compliant at all times.
Essentially, this means that you need to be up to date with the ethnicity of your employees and potential h Read the rest of this entry »
